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Bound by Honor by Colette Gale

“An Erotic Novel of Maid Marian”. OK, so Erotica is not a genre I read but after seeing this post at A Reader’s Respite and since I’m such a nut for the medieval period and seeing as the library had it I just had to have a look-see for my self. In this spin on the old Robin Hood legend, Marian is no “maid” but a widow. The Lionheart is off on crusade and an aging Eleanor fears John is up to no good plotting with the French King and she sends Marian to his court to spy out the truth and report back. Once there, she meets up with two old friends from her childhood, William de Wendeval (now Sheriff of Nottingham) and Robin of Locksley who is now known as Robin of the Hood and very much a wanted man. Marian soon finds herself torn between her two old friends and she’s surprised to find herself more attracted to the dark, brooding Will as she is to the dashing, flirtatious Robin.

Now since this is an erotic novel, John’s court is quite a licentious one and Marian is caught right up in the swirl of it all, starting off with she and Will watching John being orally pleasured by one woman as he watches two other women doing the nasty with each other on a nearby bed. Never fear though it gets even worse,

“She drank more, and John’s tongue thrust through the curtain of her hair, into the depth of her ear in a parody of the activity before them.”

I’ll spare you the details of the strip-chess game on a *live* chessboard (you do not want to know). Then there comes the night when John sends out special invites to certain ladies of the court for a special evening in his “Pleasure Palace”.

“The other ladies and maidservants had already been arranged in similarly provocative positions throughout the room. They were indeed a garden of living statues.”

You should have seen the poses John gives his “living statues” (I was howling by this time) and worse yet the fate of the one who moves first and loses the contest (you do not want to know). Our poor heroine was paired up with another lady who couldn’t resist…erm…taking advantage of the situation to set Marian’s passions afire (no, I am not kidding). Although finally our heroine remembers she’s there to spy and whilst the men are distracted during their orgy with the now live statues, she manages to snoop for written evidence (note: she is still nude whilst searching the other side of John’s room).

And after the big archery contest John’s arranges a little surprise at the dinner table for our heroine (a 12C dinner with potatoes on the menu!)

“But now hands were lifting her skirts. Warm fingers eased up along her hose-encased legs gently, so gently they tickled her sensitive flesh, prickling the skin beneath the thin fabric…”

Oh. My. God. But never fear, our intrepid heroine can keep her composure above table no matter what assaults she faces 😉

In the end it was an OK story with an interesting twist on the Marian/Sheriff/Robin relationships (get your mind out of the gutters I am NOT talking about a three-way), but unfortunately the bizarre sex was just too OTT for this reader to take too seriously. The writing is not bad, but the repetition got a bit old after a while. I needed a scorecard to track how many times “quim” and “little pip” were used, but I’d say it was about on par with PG’s use of Melusine in The White Queen and got old very very fast. As for all that sex? Frankly it was all rather cold and clinical with little chemistry between the players at all. Library only – although Klausner gave it five so perhaps it’s just me. 2/5 stars.

BTW, this author has two other erotica books. One is a spin-off of the Count of Monte Cristo and the other the Phantom of the Opera. Library has those but I am sooooooo not going to go there.

PS – Michele tag you are it. You have that other Robin Hood book in your possession and we all anxiously await your review.

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11 thoughts on “Bound by Honor by Colette Gale”

This sounds much better than the one about Robin’s tights. Unfortunately the library doesn’t have it but I’ll put it on the TBR list anyway. I had to look up quim in the dictionary the first time I encountered it, it’s one of those words that only seems to get used in erotica.

Sheesh. And just when I thought that writing couldn’t sink much lower… That’s the problem with erotica, when it’s good, it’s pretty damn good. But when it’s awful, it boggles the mind. Thanks for taking one for the team!

LOL – yes, Robin’s Too Tight Tights is indeed sitting here on my shelf. But actually, if you took the sex part out, the Marian book doesn’t sound half bad. I mean, it *does* sound like it has an actual, real plot going on….that’s gotta count for something right? 😛

I’ll pass on this, sounds way too cringeworthy for me to tackle. I loved her Gardella Vampire Chronicles which were under her other name (Colleen Gleason), but I just don’t think I’d be able to get through this. Although, I do wonder about her other book, The Count of Monte Christo one, I may add that to my TBR pile and see what it’s like.